My unrelenting insomnia has led me to start writing blog posts again, but I didn't want to just continue my old blog. That was last updated around 7 months ago, and a lot has happened in those months. I didn't want there to be an empty hole in the blog that made it seem like nothing had happened in seven months, so I am just starting from scratch. I've saved all of my old posts. Depending on my moods and how well an old post fits, I might repost or reference them in the future, but for now, this will be a completely new blog. This post. . . well this post is approximately two years in the making. Looking back, the issues I address in this post actually started far more than two years ago, but I can point at the two year mark as the approximate point at which these things started simmering.
(Disclaimer: This rant is about how I live my life. I am not angry at anyone in particular. I don't want anyone to change how they act around me or apologize. This isn't about any one person or event. This is a buildup of events over the past several years, and something that happened at work today was just the straw that broke the camel's back. I just want anyone who reads this to understand why I might be acting differently in the days to come.)
Einstein famously said, “Only a life lived for others is worth living.”
A noble sentiment, and one that I have built my life around.
I spend my days working at a treatment facility for troubled young men. Each day I am disrespected, insulted, and generally disdained. It is a regular occurrence for me to be threatened or hit. I accept this as part of my job. I enjoy the thrill I get when I see that a young man has made a breakthrough and attributes some of his success to my help, but unfortunately such an event is rare and usually short-lived.
When I get home, I spend much of my time helping my family, but what time I don't spend with them, I usually spend online talking to friends. Often these conversations with friends become me helping them through whatever problems they are having at the moment. I sometimes spend hours acting as a relationship counselor for people; giving advice, consoling, analyzing, and empathizing from dusk till dawn. This trend continues at work, as I hear coworkers complain about their boyfriends, wives, and husbands (I'm the only non-married man on the program). I hear about the boyfriends who don't give enough attention, the wives who nag, the love interests who emotionally abuse, the husbands and boyfriends who cheat. I listen to the bitching about the forgotten anniversaries, wish happy birthday when the significant other treats it as just another day, and console through the heartbreaks.
AND I AM GETTING SICK AND TIRED OF IT ALL!
All around me I see men acting like assholes, but living with a wife and kids. I see guys cheating, lying, ignoring, and generally hurting women, who then make excuses for them, blame themselves, and in many cases go right back to the guy who just hurt them (Note that I said most cases. I have nothing but respect for my coworker who is currently splitting from her deadbeat husband). It boggles the mind.
Maybe I should have looked a little deeper into Einstein's life before I subscribed to his theory. I naively thought that judging from his statements, Einstein was a firm believer in the Golden Rule and Karma. . . HAH! The man was a womanizer whose first marriage fell apart because he was too lecherous and she left him. His second marriage (which almost didn't happen because HE ALMOST MARRIED THE WOMAN'S DAUGHTER INSTEAD) was anything but happy, and there is evidence that he had at least ten mistresses over the course of his two marriages. He was one of the men I described in the above paragraph, and yet he is described as a romantic and charming man.
I'm sick and tired of the way I've been living. What, other than the whole asshole factor, is different between me and the men I see around me? Well, tonight I think I figured it out. They did one thing very differently from me. I've taken relationship advice from countless female friends, and each and every one of them has told me that I'm a good friend, and that is what women want in a relationship. But that isn't what the guys I see in relationships have done. For the most part, they have gone into things with no illusions about being friends. They've gone into the relationship with the intent of it being a “romantic relationship” (I use quotes because most of these relationships are anything but romantic, but it is the generic term for them). Looking back at my history, I can see that most of the time I have failed to attract the interests of the women I have been interested in because I had already established myself as the “lovable, non-threatening, and always dependable buddy who's always there when Mr. Right screws up” and not as a potential partner. So, from now on, when I start a new relationship, I will assess the situation and decide “friend or lover” from the get-go.
What does this mean for my life and the people I already have relationships with? Well, I'm going to start doing a little less for everyone else and a little more for George. I'm taking less overtime and spending more time out enjoying myself in the world. I'm going to start worrying less about making everyone else happy, and a little more about making George happy. I'll probably still listen to your problems and give some advice, but don't expect me to pander anymore. I'll give my view of the situation, and then move on to another topic. I'm not your therapist, I'm not your relationship counselor. I'm George. I'm your friend, and while I will give support and advice, I won't spend five hours analyzing why your asshole/bitch of a love interest is an asshole/bitch. I'll just do that now and will refer people to this post in the future.
Why is [Insert name here] acting the way [he/she] is?
Well you see, it is quite simple. Assholes are assholes, and bitches are bitches. Contrary to popular belief, if a person is an asshole or bitch, they tend to stay that way. Cheaters cheat. Liars lie. Abusers abuse. That is the way things go. If you realize that someone is an asshole or bitch, leave them. Now, I am not saying that if someone makes a mistake you should drop them like a hot stone. Humans make mistakes. It is when they do the same thing repeatedly that it can be identified as a pattern or habit, and those are extremely hard to change in any significant way.
Move on with your life and find someone who is better for you. Don't give someone infinite chances because you love them. If they loved you back in the same way, they wouldn't keep doing whatever it is that hurts you... at least, if you have opened your mouth and expressed that what they are doing is hurtful. If not, then grow the fuck up and do so.
There you have it folks, that's my philosophy on relationships. Now if you will excuse me, I have to be at work in 15 minutes.
Now I shall end this with a quote I was shown tonight that just fits right now.
"The moral purpose of a man’s life is the achievement of his own happiness. This does not mean that he is indifferent to all men, that human life is of no value to him and that he has no reason to help others in an emergency. But it does mean that he does not subordinate his life to the welfare of others, that he does not sacrifice himself to their needs, that the relief of their suffering is not his primary concern, that any help he gives is an exception, not a rule, an act of generosity, not of moral duty, that it is marginal and incidental—as disasters are marginal and incidental in the course of human existence—and that values, not disasters, are the goal, the first concern and the motive power of his life." - The Ethics of Emergencies, "The Virtue of Selfishness," 49.
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